Posts tagged ‘North America’

Voters in California’s Monterey County passed a ballot initiative Tuesday to ban hydraulic fracturing in the county, a vote which may shut down all oil production in the coastal county after roughly 70 years there.

Voters approved the initiative, known as Measure Z, which will ban the use of fracking and other high-intensity methods of oil and gas extraction, such as acid stimulation, prohibit new oil and gas operations in the county and phase out operational oil and gas wells.

An Austrian company, steelmaker Voestalpine, started making hot-briquetted iron (HBI) — a steelmaking raw material that can be melted like scrap — at a $740 million plant in Corpus Christi, Texas. The 2 million mt/year operation represents the largest investment ever made in the US by an Austrian company.

The recent invitation by OPEC for US officials to join in production freeze talks is clearly a nod to the production powerhouse Americas has become as a result of the shale revolution.

But it wasn’t always that way. Just ask former US Energy Secretary Bill Richardson, who, 16 years ago, was the point person in talks with Saudi Arabia to boost production, which would keep US gasoline prices stable.

Some of US cities supplied by the West Shore pipeline had to turn to unconventional supply sources this summer in order to meet area gasoline and diesel demand in the months since the indefinite closure of the Chicago-area refined products pipeline.

It is well known that shale-driven ethylene expansions are taking place in the North American market. The question is, will these growing supplies of olefins outstrip the ability of units downstream to take in product?

Steel trade may not be hash-tagged on social media as much as Steph or LeBron, but American steelmakers are hitting shots from almost every spot on the floor as they take aim against what they steadfastly maintain are illegally traded steel imports.

From Main Street USA to The Mall in DC, people now get it: Steel is relevant. Global trade is a huge issue. #TrumpSaysSo

The world’s largest emergency stockpile of crude oil is quickly falling apart.

The stockpile’s infrastructure, which currently stores 695.1 million barrels at four sites along the US Gulf Coast, is nearing the end of its design life and in need of a roughly $2 billion makeover, US Department of Energy officials claim.